#MORAL CLARITY

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Michael Rubin

Secretary of State Antony Blinken smells like desperation. After meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for more than two hours, Blinken said the current proposal to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and win the release of Hamas-held hostages is "maybe the last" opportunity.

Blinken is wrong. The last opportunity to win a ceasefire and release Hamas captives came when he agreed to negotiate with a terrorist group whose covenant embraces genocide and whose ideology envisions Islamic rule with religious and sexual minorities condemned to second-class status if not slavery or death.

When diplomats fall back on process, too often they lose sight of the forest through the trees. The fact remains: Hamas invaded Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, during a ceasefire to which the terrorist group had agreed. Its members raped, slaughtered, and took civilians hostage. The return of those hostages should always have been the precondition to negotiations rather than the conclusion. If Palestinians in Gaza did not want to see their territories' collateral destruction, they could return hostages under their control or inform about their whereabouts. This is not farfetched considering that Hamas has kept hostages in supposedly civilian hospitals, in private homes, and even with U.N. employees.

To negotiate with Hamas over its blatant violation of humanitarian law not only empowers Hamas, but it permanently degrades international law.

Blinken's second mistake was his choice of mediator. A good rule of thumb: Never place strategic interests in a mediator ideologically committed to your destruction. Egyptians may be aloof and, as the tunnels under the Philadelphi Corridor show, double-dealing, but Qatar too often uses its vast wealth to promote the Muslim Brotherhood's ideology that at its core rejects all aspects of Western liberalism and democracy.

Blinken has also tried to include Turkey in any post-conflict order. This, too, is bizarre. Years of pandering to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan combined with the Turkish despot's similar Muslim Brotherhood-infused ideology makes Turkey far less a partner for peace than an undesignated sponsor of terrorism. To offer Erdogan influence over post-Hamas Gaza would be akin to putting white supremacist David Duke in charge of post-apartheid South Africa.

Blinken's third mistake is treating the Palestinian Authority as a moderate alternative to Hamas. Palestinian Chairman Mahmoud Abbas is now in the third decade of his four-year presidential term. As Blinken has restored funding to Abbas, Abbas has shown his true colors. Speaking in Turkey just the other day, Abbas declared, "America is the plague and the plague is America."

There is no substitute for moral clarity. Moral compromise, meanwhile, substitutes groveling for justice.

After Iran released its 52 American hostages on President Ronald Reagan's first day in office, former Deputy Secretary of State Warren Christopher published a collection of essays by Carter administration alumni crowing triumphant for their success. Their thesis? The persistence of diplomacy led Ayatollah Khomeini to release his prisoners. Peter Rodman, a former Kissinger aide, responded in an article that Christopher and crew got it backward: The Islamic Republic let its hostages go when the cost of their captivity grew too high to bear.

Rather than pressure Netanyahu and have aides, underlings, and surrogates slime a duly elected leader, Blinken should be introspective. Had Blinken at every opportunity not indulged Hamas's conceits or played into the agenda of the group's enablers such as Qatar and Turkey, the hostages today might be free and the Hamas-imposed war over. President Joe Biden's base might hand wring and indulge in an orgy of antisemitism, but the road to peace rests on bringing so much pain to bear on Hamas that it has no choice but to release its captives and end its reign of terrorism over Gaza's 2.5 million Palestinians.

[a-typical]

“If it can be destroyed by the truth, it deserves to be destroyed by the truth.” ― Carl Sagan

[bunnyhugs22]

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Charles Fain Lehman

Published: Apr 14, 2022

Frank James, the man arrested for Tuesday's New York City subway shooting, is a black nationalist and outspoken racist who railed against whites, Jews, and Hispanics. A careful reader of the New York Times could be forgiven for overlooking that. In a nearly 2,000-word article on the attack, James's race is not mentioned. The same is true for the coverage offered up by Reuters; the Washington Post only mentioned James's race in relation to his condemnation of training programs for "low-income Black youths."

Media critics on the right say that the conspicuous omission of James's race from these news reports illustrates a trend among prestige papers, which deemphasize or omit the race of non-white criminals while playing up the race of white offenders. But is it a real pattern?

Yes. A Washington Free Beacon review of hundreds of articles published by major papers over a span of two years finds that papers downplay the race of non-white offenders, mentioning their race much later in articles than they do for white offenders. These papers are also three to four times more likely to mention an offender's race at all if he is white, a disparity that grew in the wake of George Floyd's death in 2020 and the protests that followed.

The Free Beacon collected data on nearly 1,100 articles about homicides from six major papers, all written between 2019 and 2021. Those papers included the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Chronicle, and Minneapolis's Star-Tribune—representatives of each paper did not return requests for comment for this article. For each article, we collected the offender's and victim's name and race, and noted where in the article the offender's race was mentioned, if at all.

The data suggest an alarming editorial trend in which major papers routinely omit information from news reports, presenting readers with a skewed picture of who does and doesn't commit crime. These editorial choices are part and parcel with the "racial reckoning" that swept newsrooms in the wake of Floyd's murder, which saw journalists dramatically overhauling crime coverage to emphasize the view that the criminal justice system is racist at the root—perhaps at the expense of honesty about individual offenders' crimes.

The chart above indicates that papers are far quicker to mention the race of white murderers than black. (Those two races account for 92 percent of mentions in the data, so others are not shown.) Half of articles about a white offender mention his race within the first 15 percent of the article. In articles about black offenders, by contrast, mentions come overwhelmingly toward the end of the piece. Half of the articles that mention a black offender's race do not do so until at least 60 percent of the way through, and more than 20 percent save it until the last fifth of the article.

Of course, journalists choose not only where in a piece to mention an offender's race, but also whether to mention it at all, and omissions can skew a reader's perspective.

To measure these choices, we identified the race of the offender in roughly 900 stories where his name, but not his race, was mentioned, first by looking at the race of people with the same name in Census data, and then hand-confirming race based on mug shots or other images published in local news stories.

Doing so permits an estimate of how often journalists highlight an offender's race—or don't. Again, the skew is startling: White offenders' race was mentioned in roughly 1 out of every 4 articles, compared with 1 in 17 articles about a black offender and 1 in 33 articles about a Hispanic offender.

This effect is driven in part by a handful of major news stories involving white perpetrators, though the attention paid to these stories is also an editorial choice. But even after omitting reports about white offenders Kyle Rittenhouse, Derek Chauvin, and the killers of Ahmaud Arbery, the race of white offenders is mentioned in 16 percent of cases, two to three times the rate at which the race of black offenders is mentioned. (Middle Eastern offenders were labeled as Asian in this analysis, but labeling them as white results in only a small change to the race mention rate.)

This disparity widened following George Floyd's murder. Before May of 2020, papers were roughly twice as likely to mention the race of a white (13 percent of stories) versus a black perpetrator (7 percent). After May of 2020, the numbers were 28 percent and 4 percent, a ratio of seven to one. Even omitting the above-mentioned stories, papers still mentioned race in 23 percent of stories about white killers post-Floyd, a six-to-one ratio.

It could be that there were more stories in which a white offender's race was relevant after Floyd's death than before. But it is also easy to see how the increased attention to white murderers represents a change in what reporters and editors thought it was, and was not, important for their readers to hear about, particularly after they publicly committed to revamping their crime reporting following Floyd's death.

Newspapers across the country—including the Inquirer—stopped publishing mugshot galleries in part because, two Florida newspapers wrote, they "may have reinforced negative stereotypes." Others committed to overhauling their language, substituting phrases like "formerly incarcerated person" for "felon" to respond to what the Poynter Institute described as an "inextricabl[e]" link between reporting on crime and "race and racism." And the Associated Press amended its style guide to discourage the use of the word "riot," which allegedly has racist connotations.

At the same time, major newsrooms have prioritized "racial justice" coverage, part of a push for what the journalist-cum-activist Wesley Lowery called "moral clarity" over "objectivity": writing news reports that take the sides on contested issues with the goal of advancing a political objective.

Such "moral clarity" may mean downplaying black crime and emphasizing white crime. In the case of offenders like James, it means leaving readers in the dark about an important element of the story—journalistic malfeasance that is, of course, in service of the greater good.

==

You don't hate legacy media enough.

[futurebird]

Trump is an adept politician with an innate sense of what will sell. A sense is finely tuned to a portion of the population many of us have not much in-common with-- so it's easy to miss how he is appealing.

I just listened to a rambling word salad from him on abortion. And yet on closer inspection I could see that he managed to give an answer that would be acceptable to both the radical pro-life, to the people who don't care about abortion and to people who think it should be legal "in some cases" (while still being morally uncomfortable with the topic.)

Trump's "base" isn't a monolith, that they seem to exist politically as a monolith is precisely the result of his skill in speaking to their feelings in a relatable and reasonable way ... despite the diversity of opinions in that group.

Trump fans don't have as much in common with each other as we sometimes think. The only real uniting theme is anti-intellectualism.

They were called "Know Nothings" because of the secrecy, but that name's other implications are not an accident.

"anti-intellectual" isn't just a fancy way of saying stupid. Intellectualism can be elitist, corrosive. Productive critique is possible. Such a critique could lead to a more authentic, inclusive (effective) practice in the sciences.

Of course, this isn't what Trump offers. Not an empowering "you can know! You CAN understand the world." but rather "the people who said you didn't know aren't worth respecting (even if they are right, heck BECAUSE they are right)" It's all emotional.

More importantly his answer on abortion, rather than outline policy expressed the way republicans *feel* about abortion. He expressed religious righteousness, but also ambivalence "some women don't know they are pregnant at 5 weeks." He reaffirmed that "we are the good people" by pivoting to how Democrats are evil "HRC wants to rip the baby right out!"

This helps his audience regain a sense of moral clarity on an issue that can be morally difficult for them.

People will know and love people who have had abortions-- people will have had abortions *themselves* and still be anti-choice. They know this isn't a simple issue. The stories about women nearly dying, the little girls forced to have their rapists babies disturb pro-lifers as much as anyone. But if they can imagine that the issue is less complex: if it's about "ripping the baby out at 8 months" the distress caused by the complexity of the issue is gone. It feels good to "know" you are right.

Gotta be exhausting how Democrats keep making it complicated again.

Factually he said nothing. (Worse, he contradicted himself.) Emotionally? Ah! There he said much. He recognized the chaotic spectrum of feelings but then refocused those feelings as narrow white light, a laser-focused pure beam of righteous anger and of disgust. 5 weeks? 7 weeks? Heartbeats? Exceptions? Who knows. (who cares?) What really matters is: the other side is WRONG. We are the good people who know what is right.

[planetoidsfun]

Mandrake demonstrating outstanding moral clarity.

[chloeworships]

Well well…. what do we have here?? This is EXACTLY what the LORD told us from the start of this war. Remember?

It was always about propaganda and twisting the truth.

How could the world believe a health ministry run predominantly by terrorists? 🤔 Really? 😳

We ain’t that gullible, are we?

SN: I was reading about the Black plague in Europe, they blamed Jews for that too until they learned it originated in China. This occurred in 1347. It’s almost 2025. Has anything changed? Do humans learn anything from the past? Everything is the fault of the “Jews”. They have been scapegoated for centuries and it’s just so wrong and the world falls, once again, for the okie-dok. It’s shameful. No wonder the LORD is bringing another devastating plague.

Recall, I had a dream about the Wonder bread. LOL 😂 God is a comedian, sadly this won’t be funny when it arrives 😔💔

Liars who push these false narratives will have blood on their hands. You don’t have to physically kill someone to be guilty of murder. You can be an accessory when you lie on a people who then are wrongfully persecuted. Many people will be guilty. Oh yes ✋🏾The LORD will confirm this to you as he has done with me.

Btw he keeps showing me as a judge with a white wig on, along with a man I don’t recognize, recently 👩🏾‍⚖️👨🏻‍⚖️ It reminds me so much of Deborah, who wasn’t just a judge or prophet but a warrior for Israel 🇮🇱

I’m not saying Israel hasn’t made mistakes. Who doesn’t when fighting against evil on a mass scale? This is an unprecedented war no modern country has ever had to fight, but this is not a genocide. This is modern URBAN warfare. This is what it looks like.

This was an infiltration of societal systems at the highest order (UNRWA). These were terrorists hiding in plain sight amongst innocent Palestinians and Jews alike. We saw UNRWA employees drag a dead body in a driveway to dispose of it in God knows where by the same organization that claims to be neutral but condemns Israel and not Hamas. Instead the world ignored that murder and condemned Israel, instead of rallying behind her to help find hundreds of her missing hostages. What a wicked people some are.

Countries (especially European countries) have gone to war for far less than the massacre that took place in Israel 🇮🇱 and yet, we try to re-define genocide so we can lock up their leaders because war and defending your country is an inconvenience to the rest of the world and their POLITICAL agendas.

Unbelievable. Unconscionable.

I will never forget this. I will never forget what humanity has done in the name of hatred.

I saw death and sickness coming and it breaks my heart because God tried to warn everyone but they didn’t listen ⚠️

People will be held accountable for the lies that they tell. Watch and see.

Thank you for the article. May the LORD immensely bless the truth tellers. Please don’t forget them LORD.

I have a warning dream to share for the people of Israel (but not exclusively though), rappers and Africans.

We will talk soon.

[howdoesone]

How does one philosophically approach the question of a squeaky clean conscience after washing the dishes?

The simple act of washing dishes, a mundane chore in the daily routine, can serve as a profound metaphor for examining the state of our conscience. Just as we scrub away the grime and residue from plates and utensils, we can contemplate the process of cleansing our moral and ethical selves. This article explores how one might philosophically approach the concept of achieving a squeaky clean…

[sanctiphera]

This is moral clarity in real time.

Douglas Murray SHUTS UP Piers Morgan On Supporting Terrorist Group

[triviallytrue]

Wild that there's still a lot of discourse about whether or not Hamas did this or that atrocity on Oct 7 - if Hamas did everything they were accused of, it still wouldn't be okay for Israel to kill tons of unrelated Palestinians, and if Hamas did nothing besides kidnap around 150 people and murder hundreds of civilians, this would still not be okay

[improbable-outset]

𝐒𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐲 𝐟𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐚𝐭𝐬𝐯 𝐚𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐨𝐬

There’s been an influx of Miguel writers losing their hyperfixation (understandably so 🥲) so I put together some of my favourite ai audios from tiktok. Even if it doesn’t spark some inspiration, I’d still love to share them bc they make me happy :)

Some will be Miguel x listener (hence why I used the x reader tag) and some will include other atsv characters

Spider-class with Mr.O’Hara [Part 2]

Miguel coming to our universe [can’t find part 2 💀] [Part 3] [Part 4]

Hobie offers Miguel 🍃 [Part 2] [Part 3]

MIGUEL SAYS THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

Spiderman 2099 meets Earth 42 Miles

Miguel comforts YOU

Miguel reading your thirst comments

Rio pulls up to the Spider Society (I’m sorry I’m linking most of this dude’s videos, they’re too entertaining lmaooo)

Rio swings Miguel with the Chancla

“I’m lurking 👀”

Miguel coming home late

A comforting Miguel audio

New years with Miguel

Mi perrrrrra

Words of affirmation from Miguel (Spanish)

Miguel discourages you from participating in an upcoming massacre

Miguel, Hobie and The Spot share Mexican food

More Miguel, Hobie and The Spot stuff

That’s all I could find so far, good night <3

[ancaporado]

[blitzstrikebop]

in light of recent events

[lonestardust]

carlos' eyes in the meeting room........ carlos' eyes at the hospital..... at the IC room..... his guts are boiling with hot rage!!! this very stubborn hope. it's in the clench of his jaw since the funeral. the lump in his throat that he swallows back every time because that's how the gut-wrenching vestige of murder that hasn't received its justice yet feels like."i see it now. the eyes.." because that's the glimpse of the resolute unswerving gabriel in him that echos 'if there are tears to weep we do it when the time comes, not before'. you grief but you don't get defeated when there is still work to do in order to rest in that grief. and GODDD carlos is so righteously resolved about getting there. i want him so so bad to solve the case. finally bring that retribution and avenge his family and himself. he's been in the waxing and waning throes for too long he only deserves the purgation and finality of it more than anything!!!!!

because no way all of this relentless endeavour and sharp stubborn wit would culminate to anything but cracking it. even storytelling wise that would be disheartening not to bring it to its desired ends. because imagine. all this time carlos was so right about the rangers from the start. then he looped in. was kept so close under their wing. and then he now realises that he wasn't really truly '''stuck''' but he was trapped and misled instead and it's all tumbling down now over their heads and he's seeing through the cracks. finally the darkness makes sense and he can move in action through the pinnacle and into the resolution!!!

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

BANKSY

* * * *

It felt right. There was no pain, but a real clarity. The long process of seeing the flaws in my belief structure and carefully tiptoeing around the frayed edges as parts of it were torn out, piece by piece—that was all over. The angels, watching from my shoulders; the mental tension about having sex without marriage, and drinking alcohol, and not observing any religious obligations—they were gone. The ever-present prospect of hell fire lifted, and my horizon seemed broader. God, Satan, angels: these were all figments of human imagination. From now on I could step firmly on the ground that was under my feet and navigate based on my own reason and self-respect. My moral compass was within myself, not in the pages of a sacred book.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali · Infidel (2007)

[planetoidsfun]

Go ahead. Make my punk, day.